(Washington, DC) — In 2008, the U.S. EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued new compensatory mitigation regulations in response to the 2006 U.S. Supreme Court ruling on wetland jurisdiction. The new regulations are a significant development in the process of streamlining existing rules and guidelines created to achieve the national goal of “no net loss” of wetlands.
The March-April issue of the National Wetlands Newsletter provides an in-depth look at the potential impacts of the new compensatory mitigation regulations on wetlands. The featured articles, excerpted from the forthcoming issue of the Stetson Law Review, offer a dynamic discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of the regulations and identify key areas in which the wetlands community can expect stronger protections, as well as specific ideas on how to address areas of needed improvement.
Numerous professionals in the public and private sectors, including former members of the National Research Council Committee on Mitigating Wetland Losses, weigh in on the inclusion of a watershed approach, stewardship in conservation and mitigation banking, conservation easements, adaptive management, avoidance, ecosystem services, and the implementation of the Corps’ Standard Operating Procedures.
The Stetson Law Review graciously allowed the Newsletter to provide readers with a “sneak peak” of its upcoming Volume 38, Issue 2, where each of the featured articles will appear in full.
For three decades, the nationally recognized National Wetlands Newsletter has been a widely read and esteemed journal on wetlands, floodplains, and coastal water resources. The Newsletter, published by the highly respected Environmental Law Institute®, analyzes the latest issues in wetland regulation, policy, science, and management through feature articles written by local, national, and international experts from a variety of perspectives.